The Valley of The Kings felt roasted like the devil was renting it out to the dead Kings for the summer.
Ryan Pearson fixed the position of his backpack, his eyes squinting as he looked at the glistening hills under the sunlight. Heat waves felt like they were twisting the air, hitting them mercilessly. The t-shirt he was wearing was stuck to his back with sweat, but he didn't care. He had been waiting for this moment since he got the scholarship to Cairo University.
KV62. They were about to enter the tomb of the famous Tutankhamun. Ryan couldn't wait to get inside.
"This place is crazy, right?" Megan muttered beside him, her golden hair tied in a bun, and holding her notebook to her chest. Her eyes were wide and sparkled. "Like… for real. Tutankhamun."
Leo who was walking behind them groaned, while dragging his feet through the sand, his shoes heavy with it. "I can't feel my skin anymore. Are you guys sure we are not being taken into a roaster?"
Glancing over his shoulder, Ryan smirked at his friend's complaint as he responded. "You'll live. Probably."
Leo gave the back of Ryan's head a flat look. "Probably?" he said. "Bro, thanks for the pep talk. Real confidence booster."
"Dude, you're the one who signed up," Ryan shot back.
"Yeah, because Hassan promised extra credit. Didn't realize the bonus was a goddamn heatstroke like this."
Megan rolled her eyes with a little annoyance. "You two are literally hopeless."
Dr. Hassan's voice cut through their playful bickering as he stood at the entrance. "This is not a tourist attraction. KV62 is fragile. No flash photography. Do not touch the walls. Don't talk loudly. We must respect the dead."
Leo muttered softly. "Yeah, respect. Got it. Too bad we can't livestream a cursed tomb, huh? Would've gone viral."
Megan elbowed him hard. Ryan just snorted and went into the tomb, following the other students.
Inside, the air changed immediately. It felt cooler, but heavy and stuffy. Ryan felt like there was dust clinging to his throat, and he tried to clear it a few times. But that discomfort was forgotten after his eyes saw the walls painted with hieroglyphs, and his breath was held.
Gods and goddesses. Ritual. Hieroglyphs from textbooks now seem to live in front of his eyes. The solar disk of Ra glowing in red and gold. The black jackal head of Anubis staring at him sharply. The colors of the pictures and symbols were still bright, even though they were three thousand years old.
Then his eyes caught something among the pictures that filled the wall that he found odd. A repeating lotus motif, and a gap in the symmetry near the Ra disk. He stopped, ignoring the other students and his professor who had already walked ahead to other chambers with the guide.
His hands were busy drawing the strange symbols in his notebook. This was no coincidence. Was the restoration wrong?
Megan leaned over his shoulder. "Seriously? We just entered for thirty seconds, and you're already full nerd mode dissecting the wall art?"
"This is important," Ryan muttered, his eyes focused on the symbols.
Megan groaned. "He is really obsessive, isn't he?"
Leo's voice echoed behind them. "Hello, hello. Day three. I'm trapped in cursed tomb with Nerd A and Nerd B. Send help immediately. Preferably snacks."
The joke was followed by a laugh, when Megan punched Leo's arm. "You're a freak!"
As they left the Burial Chamber, they kept bickering, leaving Ryan to catch up.
Ryan ignored both of them. His brain was screaming that there was something strange about those symbols… it felt wrong. It looked more alive.
"Pearson!" Hassan's voice snapped him back to reality. "Quit dragging your feet. The Artifact Room's waiting."
Ryan shoved his pen in his notebook and got up. "Yeah, yeah, I'm coming."
—and the pen slipped, fell to the floor, then rolled into a crack under the sarcophagus.
"Duh, seriously?" Ryan groaned, and immediately crouched down, trying to reach his pen in the crack. He managed to get it and was about to stand back up, when the room started to shake.
More precisely, it was not just the Burial Chamber, but the whole ground that trembled, like when there was an earthquake. The floor shook, and cracks appeared like spider webs on the ceiling of the room. Dust fell on Ryan, making him cough uncontrollably.
Stones and debris fell into the corridor, and to the front of the entrance to the Burial Chamber, trapping him inside. And to make matters worse, the lights in the room went out.
When the dust began to clear, the room's entrance was completely sealed by stones and rubble. He was stunned, then rushed toward the closed entrance, groping in the dark, trying to push or pull the stones while screaming in panic.
"Megan! Leo!" His throat cracked. "Professor! Anybody!"
But there was no answer. Just silence pressing in on him.
After thirty minutes trying to dig a way out without success, he finally staggered back. Realizing that maybe the group had gone out of the tomb, saving themselves. And he was left behind, trapped alone.
Ryan started to panic, and took out his cell phone. The battery was only twenty-six percent, and there was no signal.
"Oh… great. Just fucking perfect," he mumbled desperately.
Suddenly, right behind him, starting from one of Ra and Anubis' images, golden tendrils spread on the wall between the paintings and symbols. Ra's solar disk shone, Anubis's eyes became sparkling, and all the pictures and symbols seemed to come alive after being hit by the tendrils.
Ryan backed away slowly, his eyes wide. " What the actual fuck…"
After all parts of the wall were filled with the golden tendrils, they disappeared. With a pounding heart, he observed the entire room which was now in total darkness once more.
A soft gold panel with glowing black writing appeared suddenly in front of him, making him yelp.
[SYSTEM ACTIVATED]
[Welcome, Chosen of Anubis.]
Ryan blinked, recognizing that the panel was similar to the LitRPG comics he had read. "Eh… okay. This is either a hallucination or I'm really dead…"
But the text disappeared, and was replaced with new ones.
[STATUS WINDOW]
[Name: Ryan Pearson.]
[Title: Chosen of Anubis.]
[Rank: E—Novice Absorber.]
[Level: 1]
[Initial EX: 20]
[Health: 100/100]
[Mortuary Essence (ME): 25/25]
[Statistics:]
[Strength (STR): 6]
[Agility (AGI): 7]
[Vitality (VIT): 6]
[Intelligence (INT): 7]
[Wisdom (WIS): 8]
[Charisma (CHA): 6]
[Defence (DEF): 6]
[Luck (LCK): 7]
[Skills:]
[Death Sight (Passive): Unlimited range, but clarity depends on distance and obstacles. Can sense presence/essence of living vs. dead up to 50 meters.]
[Essence Siphon (Active): Range: 50 meters. Must have line of sight or direct corpse proximity. Drains residual ME from body into user.]
[Minor Life Drain (Active): Drains small amount of life-force from a target. Converts that life-force into 1 HP + 2-5 ME (random range). Costs willpower. May cause fatigue or moral strain over time.]
[You can access this Status Window anytime by calling it.]
Ryan stared at the words, which clearly listed his name. "... Nope. This is brain-rot hallucination shit. For real. I'm just trapped, running out of oxygen, and now I'm imagining HUDs like it's a video game."
Then the gold panel disappeared, leaving the room in total darkness.
He looked around the room. "Okay… so apparently I have a skill called Death Sight or whatever," he muttered, waving his hand in front of his face.
Then he froze. He could see everything. Every detail of the stone wall, he could see it very clearly, even more sharper than in broad daylight.
"No way…"
He spun around slowly, staring at the walls, the sarcophagus, everything. "Holy shit. I can see EVERYTHING. In total darkness. Bro, this is… insane."
Feeling a little nausea, he sat on the floor, then observed the rubble that now blocked the exit from the Burial Chamber. His Death Sight showed him the gaps, edges, and weak points. He could break into it…
Suddenly he felt a tremor. It didn't come from inside the tomb, but in the distance. The vibration felt like it was spreading through the ground, all the way to his chest. He pressed a hand to the ground, feeling the vibration.
Something was wrong. Very wrong.
*******
Outside the Burial Chamber, chaos reigned. Megan's nails dug into her palms as the corridor filled with choking dust. "He's still in there! We have to get him out!"
Leo coughed violently, waving dust from his face, his face pale with terror. "The whole ceiling's collapsing! If we stay, we're next!"
Dr. Hassan ignored them both, shoving his shoulder against a massive slab of fallen rock that blocked the way. He grunted, sweat pouring down his face. He tried again, and again, until his muscles trembled with the strain. The stone didn't move, it was useless.
More cracks spiderwebbed across the ceiling above them. He had to make a choice.
"Professor, please!" Megan sobbed, her voice cracked. "Ryan… he's trapped! We can't just leave him!"
"I know!" Hassan snapped, his voice breaking too. His eyes were bloodshot with dust and grief, met hers. "But if we stay another second, none of us will make it out alive."
A deep groan of shifting rock boomed overhead. A chunk of ceiling the size of a small car crashed down just only feet away, shattering on the floor. The students screamed.
That was it. The decision was made for Ryan.
Leo grabbed Megan's arm, yanking her back with all his strength. "Megan, move! MOVE!"
She resisted, her tears streaming, trying to pull free, but Hassan seized her other arm. "Enough! Out, now!"
The professor dragged them both down the corridor as the tomb shook like a dying beast. The narrow passageway spat dust and pebbles as the collapse spread. They stumbled into the blinding sunlight, gasping for air, coughing, and their clothes grey with powder.
Behind them, the entrance to KV62 gave a final, echoing crash. The entire doorway sealed in an avalanche of stone.
Megan spun, shoving Hassan's chest with both fists. "You left him! You left him in there! He's…" Her voice broke into sobs.
Hassan caught her wrists, his own face etched with pain. "Listen to me. If we'd stayed, you'd all be buried with him. Do you understand? I will call the authorities. I will get a rescue team. But I cannot save him with my bare hands."
Leo stood frozen, pale and shaking. "... He was right behind us. And now…"
The other teachers herded the dazed students back toward the bus, including Megan and Leo. Hassan lingered at the tomb's ruined entrance, staring at the collapsed stone, his jaw clenched tight. He looked ten years older than he had a minute ago.
He sat before the tomb's sealed entrance, a few of the male teachers clustered beside him. His fingers trembled as the emergency line finally connected. He pressed the phone tight to his ear, his voice low and urgent.
"Tutankhamun's tomb. Cave-in. One student trapped inside. Send a rescue team—immediately."